Lucas Industries

World War II and after

During World War II, Lucas was engaged by Rover to work on the combustion and fuel systems for the Whittle jet engine project, specifically making the burners. In about 1957 they started a semiconductor manufacturing plant to make rectifiers and transistors.

The company’s name was changed to Lucas Industries Ltd in 1975 and to Lucas Industries plc in 1982 when it was listed on the London Stock Exchange and became a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.

Lucas Plan (1976)

In 1976, the workforce within Lucas Aerospace were facing significant layoffs. Under the leadership of Mike Cooley, they developed the Lucas Plan to convert the company from arms to the manufacture of socially useful products, and save jobs. The plan was described at the time by the Financial Times as "one of the most radical alternative plans ever drawn up by workers for their company", and by Tony Benn as "one of the most remarkable exercises that have ever occurred in British industrial history". The Plan took a year to put together, consisted of six volumes of around 200 pages each, and included designs for 150 proposed items for manufacture, market analysis and proposals for employee training and restructuring the firm's work organisation.

The plan was not put into place but it is claimed that the associated industrial action saved some jobs. In addition, the Plan had an impact outside of Lucas Aerospace: according to a 1977 article in New Statesman, "the philosophical and technical implications of the plan (were) now being discussed on average of twenty-five times a week in international media". Workers in other companies subsequently undertook similar initiatives elsewhere in the UK, continental Europe, Australia and the United States, and the Plan was also supported by and influenced the work of radical scientists such as the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science and community, peace and environmental activists through spreading the idea of encouraging socially useful production. The Plan's proposals also had an influence on the economic development strategies of a number of Labour councils, for example, the West Midlands, Sheffield, Cleveland and the Greater London Council, where Cooley was appointed Technology Director of the Greater London Enterprise Board after being sacked by Lucas in 1981.

Factory automation and lighting

In 1987, the Lucas Research Centre in Shirley, Birmingham, developed a flexible automatic assembly system designed to manufacture a range of multi-variant automobile headlamps. The system was subsequently implemented at the division's Cannock Headlamp Factory.

LucasVarity (1996)

In August 1996, Lucas Industries plc merged with the North American Varity Corporation to form LucasVarity plc. Its specific history is covered on the LucasVarity page but for the sake of continuity key aspects of the old Lucas business histories to date, particularly that referring to CAV and Lucas Diesel Systems are still included here.

In 1926 CAV was bought by Lucas. In 1931, CAV in partnership with Robert Bosch, became CAV-Bosch Ltd and began making fuel injection pumps for the diesel industry and later fuel systems for aircraft. Lucas bought Bosch's interest out in 1937 and it became CAV Ltd in 1939. In 1978 the company's name became Lucas CAV. In 1980 the Acton factory employed around 3,000 people making heavy-duty electric equipment for commercial vehicles, by this time high volume diesel fuel injection manufacturing had been relocated to larger modern factories in Kent, Suffolk, Gloucestershire, and many countries throughout the world. Acton continued to make low volume specialist pumps for the military and for Gardner engines.

The electrical business was sold to US company Prestolite Electric in 1998 and remained at Acton until relocating to nearby Greenford in 2005.

The diesel fuel injection equipment research, engineering, and manufacturing business known in later years as Lucas Diesel Systems Ltd continue at all of the worldwide sites (with the exception of those in Japan and South Carolina, US, which had closed by this time) and since 2000 has been owned by Delphi, a US-domiciled automotive parts and systems manufacturer. The name has been changed to Delphi, and the business is a major part of the Delphi Powertrain Division.

Worldwide diesel fuel injection business sites: England - Gillingham, Kent; Park Royal, London; Stonehouse, Gloucestershire. France - Blois and La Rochelle. Brazil - São Paulo. Mexico - Saltillo. Spain - Sant Cugat, Barcelona. Turkey - İzmir. India - Mannure, Chennai. Korea - Changwon, Busan.

Butlers Limited

Butlers Limited formed as a family business of brassfounders at Small Heath, Birmingham, and developed as an important manufacturer and supplier of motor vehicle lamps.

In 1948, at the time of its acquisition by Lucas, 60 per cent of Butler's production was represented by its sales of lamps of various types to Ford Motor Company and Vauxhall Motors and to Simms (who resold the lamps to heavy vehicle manufacturers) for use as initial equipment.

At this time, Butlers was supplying the whole of Ford's requirements of lamps for initial equipment. Butlers also had a substantial business in the supply to wholesalers of accessory lamps, mainly foglamps and spare tail-lamps of various sizes. Lucas reported that it knew that Ford, Vauxhall and Simms would not like the purchase and that it did not want to upset them or disturb Butlers' wholesale customers or its own wholesalers at home or abroad; nevertheless it decided to accept the offer it had received from Butlers on the general ground that it would be a mistake to refuse the additional capacity, particularly for short orders and obsolete types of lamps.

In 1952, the purchase of the share capital of Butlers was effected through nominees, and ownership by Lucas was not made public until 1952 when the company was listed as a subsidiary in Lucas's Annual Report. Also Lucas did not want to bring the spares side of Butlers' business into the Lucas distribution and service network but wished to study it and find out how it worked. Lucas also said that it did not want to add to current press criticism of itself as a monopolistic giant which absorbed competitors.

Girling

The company started as a car brake manufacturer after, in 1925, Albert H. Girling (also co-founder of Franks-Girling Universal Postage) patented a wedge-actuated braking system. In 1929 he sold the patent rights to the New Hudson company. Girling later developed disc brakes, which were successful on racing cars from the early 1950s to the 1970s. Girling brakes had the quirk of using natural rubber (later nitrile) seals, which caused difficulties for some American owners of British cars because of incompatibility with US brake fluids.

Girling brake manufacture was taken over by Lucas in 1938, but the patent remained held by New Hudson until this in turn was purchased by Lucas in 1943. Lucas then moved its Bendix brake and Luvax shock absorber interests into a new division which became Girling Ltd. Girling products included:

Brake systems

Clutch systems

Shock absorbers

Hydraulic dampers - a short-lived Luvax/Girling cooperation that moderated up and down leaf spring movement by turning that motion into a horizontal back and forth motion from the center. The damper hydraulically moderates, equally, both upward and downward motion of the wheels. In this sense, they are quite different from telescopic shock absorbers, which mainly moderate upward movement of the wheel. Such dampers were used for a few years on light-weight British post-war cars, such as MG and Austin.

Rotax

Rotax went through several name changes and manufacturing locations, the last of these being the former premises of the Edison Phonograph Company in Willesden, west London in 1913. Initially a motorcycle accessory business, Rotax began to specialise in aircraft components after the World War I. After an initial proposal for Lucas and Rotax to jointly take over CAV, Lucas decided in 1926 to take over both companies.

In 1956, Lucas Rotax opened a new plant in the new town of Hemel Hempstead to the north of London. Lucas Rotax was later renamed Lucas Aerospace. By the 1970s, the company had 15 plants at various locations.

Aerospace

Originally Called Lucas GTE (Gas Turbine Equipment) Based in Birmingham from its link with the early Rover Jet engine development. Lucas during the late 1960 and early 70s purchased (given help/encouragement by the British government) various aerospace related companies to create a British world class aerospace equipment supplier to complement Rolls-Royce Jet engine manufacturer in a failed attempt to become a major player in the expanding world aviation market. Hobson's, Rotax, the Smiths Industries aerospace related companies were all consumed to create this expanded company.

One of the many factories was based in the Park Royal Industrial Estate, London, opposite Lucas Rotax. This facility provided components for BAE Systems, principally for the Stingray Torpedo Project.

Simms

In 1913, Frederick Richard Simms started Simms Motor Units Ltd, which in World War I became the principal supplier of magnetos to the armed forces. In 1920, the company took over a former piano factory in East Finchley, North London. During the 1930s the factory developed a range of Diesel fuel injectors. In the World War II, the company again became the principal supplier of magnetos for aircraft and tanks, also supplying dynamos, starter motors, lights, pumps, nozzles, spark plugs and coils.

The East Finchley factory continued to expand after the war, eventually reaching 300,000 square feet (28,000 m2). In 1955, the company acquired seven other British light engineering companies: R.F. Landon Partners, Horstman, Mono-Cam, Hadrill and Horstmann, Industrial Fan and Heater, Clearex Products and Simplus Products. At the end of 1957, the company formally changed its name to Simms Motor and Electronics Corporation Ltd., informally known as the Simms Group. The Simms Group was taken over by Lucas in 1968 and integrated within the CAV division. Manufacturing in East Finchley was steadily run down and the factory closed in 1991 to be redeveloped for housing. It is commemorated by Simms Gardens and Lucas Gardens.